White House officials earlier this afternoon corrected the official account of the raid in Pakistan that ended in the killing of Osama bin Laden, saying that the al Qaida leader was not armed and that his wife was not killed.
The new Defense Department narrative released by the White House, and read at a mid-afternoon White House news briefing, said that one of Bin Laden’s wives was shot in the leg as she charged members of the commando team on the third floor of the compound.
“In the room with bin Laden, a woman – bin Laden’s wife – rushed the U.S. assaulter and was shot in the leg but not killed,” the brief statement said. “Bin Laden was then shot and killed. He was not armed.”
Jay Carney, the White House press secretary, read the narrative in an attempt to correct statements by administration officials who had previously indicated that bin Laden was armed.
Under questioning, Carney said that the White House stood by its claim on Monday that bin Laden had resisted capture, but said that “resistance does not require a firearm,” according to The New York Times.
Carney said that the new narrative was the result of “fresh” information.
“I want to make clear that this is, again, information that is fresh and, you know, we will continue to gather and provide to you details as we get them and we’re able to release them,” the press secretary said. “The resistance was throughout, as I said.”
On Monday, John Brennan, the top counterterrorism adviser to President Obama, said he believed that bin Laden’s wife had been killed while trying to shield the terror leader during the 40-minute raid.
But the new chronology suggested that the woman who died in the raid was part of another family living at the compound. The narrative says that woman was shot and killed on the first floor, not the third floor, where bin Laden was found and killed.
“On the first floor of bin Laden’s building, two al-Qaida couriers were killed along with a woman who was killed in cross-fire,” Carney said. “Bin Laden and his family were found on the second and third floor of the building. There was concern that bin Laden would oppose the capture operation, and indeed he resisted.”
Neither the Defense Department narrative nor Mr. Carney made any mention of the woman who was killed having been used as a “human shield” during the firefight, as previously described.
Administration officials also changed their description of how much information Obama and other senior officials in the White House had in Washington as the operation was unfolding in Pakistan.
On Monday, Brennan repeatedly said that he and others in the Situation Room were monitoring the raid “in real time.”
